Inspection of semiconductor wafers (and other objects, such as reticles, flat-panel displays, photomasks, and the like) often involves scanning the wafer or other object to determine the presence or absence of defects. Generally speaking, when the inspection aims to detect miniature defects, the image of the wafer is obtained using high magnification, often the highest magnification available using the tool. However, the higher magnification also results in a slower inspection. In other contexts, lower magnification may be used. For instance, in dark-field inspection of a memory area, the area may be blank or nearly blank if, for example, if Fourier filtering is used in a manner sufficient to eliminate the repetitive features of the area. In such circumstances, detection of a defect can be less dependent on high resolution. As another example, many defect types of high interest may be quite large (relative to the smallest possible defect) and thus may be detected using low magnification. However, low magnification may not always be ideal.